Matrilineal: Vanishing Point
by Em Meredith
Summary: I looked for you and everywhere.


TITLE: Vanishing Point   
AUTHOR: Em Meredith (emily at healthyinterest.net)  
SUMMARY: The vanishing point appears. I looked for you and everywhere. Ninth in the Matrilineal series; follows Macha's Disappear.  
SPOILERS: General season 2, up to about Countdown.   
DISCLAIMER: I'm not JJ. I'm not *nearly* that cruel. The title and summary are copyright Buck/Mills/Stipe.   
DISTRIBUTION: Cover Me. Available at our Matrilineal page (at healthyinterest.net).  
AUTHOR'S NOTES: As always, thanks to Macha, for setting aside important things like finals to help me. Thanks to kate for the Haikus of Stalking and the beta.   
  
Vanishing Point  
By Em Meredith  
  
It takes two days and four airplane flights before Sydney and Jane are back in LA.   
  
Jane, exhausted from fighting jet lag and pressure changes, falls asleep in the car on the way home from the airport. She barely stirs when Sydney carefully unbuckles her carseat and carries her into the safehouse. Sydney finds a crib in the back room, gently lays Jane down, and then collapses on the bed, expecting to sleep for hours -- possibly even days. After more than an hour of staring absently at the patterns on the ceiling, she admits to herself that she's too wired to sleep, so she heads for the living room to wait for her father.  
  
She's halfheartedly flipping through soap operas and talk shows with the remote when hears a car pull into the driveway. She flips off the television, peering cautiously out of a crack in the blinds. It's not Jack's black sedan-- this one's green -- and she starts to reach for her gun. Then Weiss gets out of the driver's side and she lets out a breath she didn't even know she was holding.  
  
Sydney greets Weiss at the door, carefully staying out of sight of the street, and ushers him inside. She takes the brown grocery bag from him before he can drop the box that he's balancing on his other hip. She leads him into the kitchen where they'll have room to spread out and work.   
  
"Where's Jane?" he asks, taking in the sparse furnishings of the safehouse. The walls are bare and the only sign of habitation is Jane's toys scattered across the floor in the living room.  
  
"She's napping. All the fussing on the planes wore her out." Sydney explains. "Where's my dad?"  
  
"Your father figured it would be safer if I came instead of him."  
  
She nods, acknowledging the shrewdness of this move, even though she's not looking forward to the uncomfortable conversation she and Weiss are sure to have. She peers eagerly at the papers he's unpacking from the box and placing in neat stacks on the kitchen table.  
  
"Please tell me you brought me something to work on," Sydney pleads.  
  
"Missing the job that much?" Weiss smirks.  
  
"I want to find Vaughn."  
  
He falters for a second, but he's not looking at her. Then he puts down the papers he's holding with deliberate care and goes for the joke, rather than the confrontation. "And you're going a little stir crazy?"  
  
She grins, grateful that he's given her a reprieve. "A little. There's only so many times you can play peek-a-boo with Jane before she gets bored. I ran through all of our games on the plane, and now we're going to be stuck in the house. I'd like to take her for a walk, or to the park, but..." she trails off.  
  
"Syd, you know that you have to be more careful in LA. There's no telling--"  
  
"I know," she sighs. "I'm just tired of being cooped up and feeling useless."  
  
"Sydney--" Weiss is interrupted by an emphatic wail from the direction of the bedroom and he jumps, startled by the noise.  
  
"Jane's up. Let me get her."  
  
Sydney hurries down the hall and manages to reach the bedroom before Jane's calls for attention turn into cries of frustration. Sydney enters the room and crosses over to the crib, reaching down to lift her daughter out. Jane is overjoyed to be rescued and she babbles happily at Sydney while her diaper's being changed.  
  
By the time they get back to the kitchen, Weiss is thoroughly engrossed in the piles of paperwork. He doesn't even look up, just points at the laptop and says, "I thought I'd take the flight records and let you handle the surveillance feeds."  
  
"Sure," she says, putting Jane in the high chair. She grabs a piece of ice from the freezer and puts it on the tray, smiling as Jane tries to grab it, only to have it slip out of her pudgy little fingers. Sydney figures this will buy her at least fifteen minutes of quiet.  
  
"I logged myself into the CIA's network," Weiss tells her. "You can start with LAX, then maybe try Burbank, Long Beach, or Ontario. Hopefully I'll find something in these passenger logs."  
  
"So," she starts, marveling a bit at how easy it is to fall back into the job as she scans the surveillance feeds from the day Vaughn left, "Why did they let you out of the office?"   
  
Weiss grins at her. "I told Kendall that I needed to get away from your father. Sloane's escape has put him in a pretty bad mood."  
  
"I bet. Even more glaring than usual?"  
  
"Oh yes. He's barking orders, snapping at people. He told me that in order to minimize your risk, he and I should interact as little as possible. Believe me when I say that that was a sacrifice that I was willing to make."  
  
Sydney smiles at that, picturing Jack storming around the Ops Center. She remembers one day in particular where she found Marshall hiding in a secluded corner to escape Jack's wrath. She pushes the memory aside, makes sure that Jane's still fascinated by the ice cube, and opens the first video feed, scanning the crowds of strangers for any sign of Vaughn.  
  
----  
  
It's two hours later when they have their first breakthrough.   
  
Sydney spots Vaughn at one of the airport terminals, picking his way through the crowd. At first she can't even speak to tell Weiss she's found a lead. She feasts on the grainy surveillance footage, taking in everything about him. She recognizes him by the way he moves, by his determined walk, even though his features are blurred. She can see him clearly enough, though, to recognize that his hair has that messy look that means he's been running his hands through it.  
  
"Weiss?"  
  
"Yeah?"   
  
"I found him. He's at Gate 47A. The time stamp is 6:58. Where's he headed?"  
  
"Hang on," Weiss sighs. Jane's gotten over her shyness from Kazakhstan and has warmed to Weiss. He's been playing with her, entertaining her with a small stuffed cow, but he sets it aside to start rifling through the flight schedules. Jane's none too pleased with this development and starts making frustrated noises at him. Sydney can't help but laugh as Weiss continues to search the papers, but picks up the toy with one hand, waving it in Jane's direction. She'll accept nothing but his full attention, though, and so she continues her protests, banging her hands on her highchair tray.  
  
"Geez," Weiss comments as he finds the right schedule. "You Bristow women sure are bossy."  
  
As soon as he's handed the schedule over, Weiss turns his attention back to the baby, making Sydney laugh as he makes the cow dance for Jane.  
  
"Okay," Sydney skims the list. "Flight 1002 to Rio. With a stopover in Managua."   
  
"Did he get off in Managua? Maybe take another flight?"  
  
Sydney sighs. "Lemme look."  
  
By the time Sydney finally traces Vaughn to Chiapas, Weiss has given up all pretense of working and is sitting cross-legged on the floor while Jane lies on a blanket. He's playing "This Little Piggie" and Jane is rewarding him with her gurgly little baby laugh.  
  
"Here he is, boarding a plane to Cozumel."  
  
"Cozumel? Our mission called for us to go halfway to Siberia, but he's traveling from one tropical vacation spot to another," Weiss complains. "Is he on the passenger manifest?"  
  
"Yeah, I think the alias he's using --" Sydney stops. "Weiss, would you listen for a second?"  
  
"Sure," he pauses long enough to sit Jane up so that they're both facing Sydney. "We're listening."  
  
Weiss starts to let go of Jane's small hands.  
  
"Be careful, she can't sit up by--" But Sydney stops, because Jane is sitting up by herself, and judging from the dimples in her cheeks, very proud of her accomplishment.  
  
"Sure she can." Weiss tells her, then he registers the look on her face. "Wait. She's never done this before?"  
  
Sydney shakes her head, not trusting herself to speak. She feels a tear slide down her cheek and brushes it away. "No," she finally manages.  
  
"They have to grow up sometime," Weiss laughs.   
  
"Yeah, but, I just--" She takes a deep breath. "He's missed so many firsts already, you know?"  
  
Weiss's smile vanishes. "I know," he says, his tone purposefully neutral.  
  
Sydney looks away, tucking her hair behind her ear.  
  
"Look, Syd," he starts, picking up Jane and carrying her over to the kitchen table so she can perch on his lap, "I know you had some tough choices to make. I can't even begin to imagine what you were going through. But Mike's my friend and I *did* see what he went through." Weiss stops and stares at her until she looks up to meet his eyes. "He didn't even know if you were alive."  
  
There's nothing she can say. No words will make up for what she's done. But even now, as much as she regrets that Vaughn's never met Jane, she's not sure she would do things any differently.  
  
"I know. I just-- I couldn't think of any other way," she sighs.  
  
"I understand that, Syd, but you could've sent more than the one email."   
  
Sydney looks at Jane, who's snuggling up to Weiss and contently chewing on her fist. "I wish I'd had other choices. I wish I'd been able to find another way. But Jane's safety had to be my first priority - nothing else mattered."  
  
"Okay," he says, "but when we find Vaughn and he's been working with your mother, remember what you just said."   
  
END.  
----  
Feedback cherished at emily at healthyinterest dot net.  
Stay tuned to our site (healthyinterest.net) for the companion piece. 


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